


Switchboard

by idiotbrothers



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Fix-It, Gen, Hallucifer arc, Mentions of suicidal ideation and mental illness, Protective Dean Winchester, Season/Series 07, Tag to 7x17, Touching, gencest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-27
Updated: 2014-08-27
Packaged: 2018-02-14 23:44:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,725
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2207517
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/idiotbrothers/pseuds/idiotbrothers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Inspired by this anonymous prompt: "I've always wanted a fic where instead of Cas finding Sam being shocked in 7x17, Dean finds him and gets all protective and stuff." </p><p>Heavy on the "and stuff".</p>
            </blockquote>





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Sam's teeth gnash on the rubber mouthpiece, convulsions shaking through him and his brain pounding and burning like it's on fire for real this time, sharper than in the memories and in the visions but somehow still better. Because this isn't some bullshit hallucination, fog in his mind that closes over him and traps him with Lucifer's sadistic whims for hours, no, this is  _real_.

At least, he's pretty sure it's real.

The thing that's going to kill him, Marcus, or so he'd said (and what a shame he turned out to be a murderous demon, because Sam had liked Marcus; he was one of the few attendants who didn't drip with false optimism every time he talked to him) is grinning. Even as his head is frying and his eyes are narrowed to tense slits, Sam can pick out the gleam of that giant white grin. Muscles pulled tight against the tourniquets, Sam lies there after round two has commenced, violent shivers racing up and down his body and his bones protesting feebly.

Marcus is saying something, but Sam only catches part of it, something like, "If it's meat, you can cook it," ( _If it bleeds, you can kill it_ , his brain offers up, and then he thinks, I've bled myself dry, but I won't stay buried). Unfair, is what that is. He'd be doing the world a favor if he could just fucking stay in the dirt like he's supposed to, no angels or demons or mule-headed older brothers pulling him back out of the muck because he's not allowed, that kind of relief isn't made for people like him. No early retirement package for you, Sammy boy, just you and Mr. Helpless and the busted wall inside your head, Satan's blessed memory faithfully shadowing you on the next hundred hunts in the next ten states.

When he can open his eyes again, Sam sees Marcus turning to the electroshock machine once more and grits his teeth painfully in anticipation, wondering how many more doses of electricity it'll take for him to clock out, alone in this too-bright room without his brother to swoop in and kill the monster and return him to the grasp of his scrambled mind, no opportune pain to take the edge off the crazy because he can't do that otherwise, can't give Dean yet another reason to worry about him.

Then, the door slams open and Marcus is being knocked to the floor, out of Sam's field of vision. He exhales in rapid bursts around the mouthpiece and closes his eyes as the struggle ensues somewhere behind him, grunting and rustling and eventually, the sound of a knife being plunged into flesh. Sam opens his eyes and Dean is coming around the bed to look at him, his hands outstretched. "Sam, Jesus Christ, are you--"  _Are you okay?_ The million-dollar question.

Dean leans over him and pulls out his mouthpiece, removes the electrodes from his forehead, his fingers shaking as they brush against Sam's skin. "Dean, what--what're you doing here?" Distracted, Dean pulls gently on Sam's shoulders and tugs him upright once the tourniquets are off, struggling with his weight as his hollow limbs knock about heavily. "I'm--Sam, we gotta get the fuck outta here before more of them show up. I don't know if Meg's managed to talk sense into Cas or what, but I'm not hinging our escape on him having a change of heart." 

Dizzy, Sam stares blankly at Dean, clueless as to what he's saying. There's a ringing in his ears that isn't helping his lucidity any. "Shit, that's right, you wouldn't know about any of--you know what, I'll explain it all later; let's just focus on the getaway right now."

"Dean. Where are we? Why am I dressed like this?" Dean freezes with his hands on Sam's arms. Sam's stomach is roiling, nausea rippling through him when he grabs onto Dean's shoulder for support and attempts to stand up. "Dean?" His brother doesn't answer, looking spooked, eyes fixed on Sam's face. Uneasy, Sam throws a glance around the room, skipping back and forth from the bleeding corpse on the ground to the machine sitting next to the bed. "Uh...this is ECT equipment," Sam says, stomach lurching unpleasantly. A lump of fear is growing in his throat, loosening his tongue because Dean still isn't talking to him and his brain feels like it was hollowed out with a paring knife.

"What's happening? Dean, c'mon, help me out here. I haven't slept in four days."

"Six," Dean says, voice oddly gruff.

"What?"

"Six days, Sam. You haven't slept in six days." Sam waves him off.

"Yeah, okay, whatever. Just tell me why I'm--"

Bile rushes up Sam's throat, and he clutches at his stomach, frowning and bending over. He has to swallow twice to keep from vomiting all over himself. Pushing Dean out of the way, he topples forward to throw up the contents of his stomach, splashes of watery spittle hitting the floor as he heaves, his throat burning. Dean helps him up when he's done, lets him lean against him even though he's probably heavy as fuck. "I need to sleep," Sam rasps, hand coming up to pinch the bridge of his nose, "before he comes back." Dean starts to shuffle forward, and Sam throws his arm across Dean's shoulders to minimize the very real risk of him falling flat on his face.

"Wait, so...Lucifer, he's gone? You're not seeing him right now?" 

"You might be jinxing it, but uh, yeah. Been M.I.A. since you showed up here...wherever  _here_  is." Dean sighs, quickens his step as much as he can with Sam's bulk resting against him. "You can sleep the second we get you in the car, alright? You're gonna be okay." 

* * *

Dean keeps peeking at Sam out of his periphery while he drives, at his crinkled brow and his flickering eyelids and his fingers digging into the bandage on his hand. He's almost tempted to wake Sam up, free him from the grip of whatever nightmare he's caught in, but that would be a monumentally stupid thing to do when this is the first time in days he's been physically able to sleep. He wonders how long it'll be until Lucifer wrenches Sam back out of it again. He wonders what the fuck he's supposed to do now that Cas has insisted that the Wall can't be fixed.

 _This is on you_ , Dean had all but shouted at him in the parking lot as Sam listed drowsily against his side. _You fucking did this to him, now pay up!_  Meg's hackles had risen at Dean's tone, taking a menacing step forward as if Cas wasn't fully capable of protecting himself, and Dean had been tempted to take his fist to both of their faces right then and there. But Sam, magnanimous as always even in his run-down state, had stopped him, spreading his palm flat on Dean's back.  _Dean, it's fine.There's nothing he can do about it. He made a bad call, got kinda overambitious--I get it, it's okay. I've been there, remember? It's pointless to hold it against him now_.

Dean had ground his teeth together at Sam's words, barely even registering the steady movement of Sam's hand along his spine.  _You want me to_ forgive _him, is that it? Just let bygones be bygones, let him sprint away to slaughter some more of his pals while you sit here on the brink of death because of what_ he _did?_  Castiel hadn't tried to defend himself, but his mouth was stretched taut, his head pointed uncharacteristically downwards as he avoided both Sam and Dean's eyes.  _I think you're conveniently leaving something out_ , Meg had interrupted, scornful curl to her lip,  _And that something is the starring role you played in all this. It wasn't Clarence here who forced Sam's soul in all crooked, was it_. That had shut Dean up, made Sam sigh softly in Dean's ear. 

 _I thought so_ , Meg had scoffed.  _If I were you, I'd set the blame game aside for a rainy day and focus on hunting for a miracle. Because from the looks of things, you're gonna need one_. They had parted ways after that, Cas promising to go to them when they rang, Meg packing away her scowl in favor of a pitying smile for Sam, Dean bundling his half-unconscious little brother into the passenger seat and tamping down his instinctive craving for revenge.

And here they were going sixty on the interstate while Dean stewed and Sam snored, hurtling towards uncharted territory because Cas--their handyman and part-time friend, according to the history books--couldn't do the glowy-hand bit and make Sam good as new, couldn't do anything but apologize, which he had done copiously already in the parking lot, surrounded by the motionless meatsuits of the demons he'd slain. And though Dean resents him for being useless to them when he is most obligated to help them out, at least  _Cas_  can tell Sam he's sorry. Dean doesn't even want to begin to think about all the ways he's let Sam down in the past year and a half, is too scared to properly consider how things might have turned out if he'd been more careful, just like he was too scared to confront Sam when he first began noticing the way he jumped at reflective surfaces and stared out at nothing for minutes on end.

Dean steals another look at Sam, who has long since stopped snoring and is biting at his bottom lip, bandaged hand closed into a loose fist. Antsy with worry, Dean pulls the car over onto the shoulder and parks, rubbing at his eyes and grimacing at the clamorous thoughts jangling in his head. "Dean?" Sam's voice sounds as ragged as the rest of him looks. "Fuck. I didn't mean to wake you up. Here, I'll get us moving again if it's easier for--"

"Dean, he came back."

Dean's mouth falls shut. He breathes in deep through his nose, casts Sam a sidelong glance. "Um. When...?" Sam yawns wide enough that his jaw creaks audibly. "Couple minutes ago. I wasn't sleeping well anyway. Dreams, you know." He waves a hand obscurely, and Dean thinks,  _I do know_. Sam flinches very suddenly, making Dean's heart skip a beat, but then he apologizes quietly, says, "Just the peanut gallery derailing me again." Dean feels dangerously close to tears. Stony-faced, he reaches over and cradles Sam's wounded hand in his own, traces the worn edges of the bandage. Sam's fingers stiffen as Dean strokes his thumb over them one by one, and maybe Sam was expecting Dean to squeeze the scar again, break the stitches and stain the bandage, take the chance that it would be enough to dissipate Lucifer's afterimage.

Not trusting himself to speak, Dean brings Sam's hand up to his lips and presses a ghost of a kiss to his knuckles, uncaring of whether or not he's embarrassing himself. When he slips out of his reverie, Sam is gazing intently at him, head tilted like he's assessing him. "Dean," he mumbles, almost under his breath, "Are you okay?" Dean swallows thickly, notices that his hold on Sam's hand has grown rigid. He lets go, bites out, "I'm fine." Sam's expression is pained, dark bags under his eyes thrown into stark relief when a car speeds past them.

"No, you're not." Dean toes idly at the brake. "No...I'm not," he agrees. Sam's lips part, but he doesn't say anything, just fixes his eyes on a point past Dean's head, his concentration broken up and redirected. Setting his jaw, Dean leans over in his seat and pulls Sam into a rough hug, the position uncomfortable but more or less adequate, his hands fisting in the hospital pajamas that Sam is still wearing and his chin hooking over Sam's shoulder. Sam is trembling lightly, but he relaxes into the embrace after what feels like mere seconds, his palm traveling soothingly over Dean's spine like it had in the parking lot. Speaking of which. "How can you stand to be so damn  _rational_  right now?"

Dean hopes the hitch in his voice is muffled by the fabric of Sam's sleeve. Sam's fingers have found their way to the nape of Dean's neck, stroking at the short hairs there. "Trust me, Dean, I'm hardly at my most level-headed here."

"So some part of you has gotta be angry, right? You've gotta want to take this out on someone? How could you just--forgive Cas, like it was nothing? He used your sanity as a--as a fucking  _bargaining chip_." Like Sam had no real say in whether or not they jumped on Cas's bandwagon, like the only way to coerce them into joining him was to screw with Dean, and the fastest way to screw with Dean was to break Sam. Like Sam was Dean's toy, for Christ's sake.

Thinking of it that way, Dean knows that the demeaning assumption is not so far off the mark, that Sam's been playing follow-the-leader for his whole life, and that Dean's been especially hard on him these past couple of years, unable (or maybe just unwilling, if he's being honest) to restore their relationship to what it used to be when they were younger, to extinguish the old grudges he continues to bear, lined up in the cavern of his chest like embers.

Sam hums, arms shifting against Dean's sides. He smells factory-processed, the sterile scent of hospital all over his clothes and his hair, overpowering. "I am angry, yeah. Not as much these days as I used to be. I mean, I kind of have bigger concerns at the moment. Like wondering if I'm gonna die of sleep deprivation or if I'll strangle myself before that happens." Dean's muscles tighten at that, and Sam must notice, because he shakes his head a little, hair tickling Dean's cheek. "Sorry. I'm exhausted...but you know that." He huffs a laugh, forehead pressing into Dean's shoulder, and this hug has lasted long enough to land itself firmly in 'vertical cuddling' territory, but there's nobody around to care.

"At the hospital, when Marcus was, y'know, deep-frying me..."

Dean is bewildered for half a second before he remembers the ECT room, and when exactly did Sam's startling bout of amnesia recede, because Dean had totally forgotten to debrief him after they fled the place. "I was thinking," Sam continues, "That I can't afford to keep doing this to you. You're already halfway out the door; I can't imagine what you'd do if you got more shit thrown at you." He's trying for light, but the weariness in his voice can't be masked, seeps into every word and renders it sodden and cumbersome.

"You don't have to care about how I'm dealing, Sam," Dean says, "Just do what you gotta do to help yourself. And talk to me, alright? I was being an asshole at--at Bobby's, and after that. Should've gotten you to open up about it when it started." Sam touches his neck carefully. "You did okay, all things considered." Dean doesn't protest, but his 'No' hangs in the air for a breath, two breaths. "I think," Sam says, sounding resigned, "I think the ECT is what did it. Kicked Lucifer out, I mean." Dean chews on the inside of his cheek. "Yeah?" 

"Yeah. The hand trick obviously doesn't work anymore, but. I think--as long as it's a precise amount of pain--" Dean finally draws back so that he can look Sam in the face, and Sam ducks his head under the scrutiny, hair effectively shielding his eyes. Dean uses a finger to tilt Sam's chin up, smooths his bangs out of his face. He can feel Sam's teeth chattering, a slight tremor of his jaw under Dean's hand.  _What, then?_  Dean wants to ask.  _Do you expect me to make you bleed every time you need to be bungeed back into reality?_  

But he doesn't say that, nods instead and returns to sitting properly in his seat, the absence of Sam's body heat making him shiver. He starts the engine, doesn't touch the radio even though it tempts him.

"Fill me in," he tells Sam. 

 


End file.
